The UN Launch of Poor Poverty: The Impoverishment of Measurement and Analysis
By: Michele M. Vella
New York, NY, United Nations Headquarters.
United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI) in cooperation with the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) launched the book Poor Poverty: The Impoverishment of Measurement and Analysis with an interactive on-site and virtual discussion. A collection of essays edited by Dr. Jomo Kwame Sundaram, Assistant Secretary General of DESA, and Dr. Anis Chowdhury, Senior Economic Affairs Officer DESA, Poor Poverty addresses the inadequacy of poverty measurements, analysis, and policy.
Paradoxical media reports on positive or negative changes on the state of extreme poverty led discussion participants to question the true significance of statistically significant findings. “Does poverty not equal hunger?” asked UNAI Chief Ramu Damodaran after citing a Food and Agricultural Organization report on the numerical increase of the world’s hungry and the World Bank’s report of a decrease in persons living in extreme poverty, both reports generated within months of each other.
Perhaps unlike other statistics or measurements, misrepresenting the scope of poverty translates into inhibiting and abridging full human potential, reducing the dignity and worth of life.
An adjunct to the first volume of The Poverty Challenge: Report of the World’s Social Situation (2009), Poor Poverty’s individual chapters seem to dialogue with each other - lamenting the miserable failure of economists to provide best practice guidance; calling for high and stable economic growth through a consistent macroeconomic counter-cyclical stance; warning against “silver bullets” or quick fix approaches to poverty; rallying for the expansion of fiscal and policy space inclusive of developing country perspectives and agency; shaping economic and social policy as a human right instead of a mechanism of stigmatization or mere charity issue.
Joining in virtually from the University of KwaZulu-Natal South Africa, Chair of Applied Poverty Assessment Dr. Julian May reminded on-site participants of the distinguished and necessary voices omitted when discussions and debates are not globally inclusive. Dr. May highlighted the politics of poverty policy and the insignificance of absolutist poverty measures that do not account for many economic activities/labors of the poor.
Two additional examples of irrelevant poverty measures and methodologies dovetailed Dr. May’s critique. Developed countries consistently score well on the 150 variables measuring “good governance” while developing countries consistently score negatively. In one year, the World Bank’s International Comparison Program announced a 40% increase of persons living in extreme poverty. What inaccurate methodologies accounted for the almost instantaneous inflation?
Is there any meaning to be salvaged from “poor poverty” measurements? To create authentic meaning, poverty measurements must strive for equity and inclusiveness, bringing in the voices that exist on the periphery into the lived dataset informing research. The intellectual community must strive towards multicultural competence, not mono-cultural dominance.
Dr. Kwame Sundaram reminded the audience that the ultimate test of ideas is in “the cauldron of experience,” if a poverty statistic does not have a human applicability correlate then it is devoid of significance.
UNAI asserts that the UN is both a consumer and generator of academic scholarship, encouraging sustainable solutions to global problems. When scholarship omits, silences, or marginalizes populations, it creates more not less disparity, judges humanity by an inhumane standard, renders life visible, invisible.
To watch a virtual recording of the UNAI launch discussion of Poor Poverty click on the following link: http://www.unmultimedia.org/...
To read a free version of Poor Poverty from Bloomsbury Academic website click on the following link: http://www.bloomsburyacademic.com/...